How to Sort of DIY Five Favorite Rustic Wedding Centerpieces

Do you like the look of rustic centerpieces and want to recreate a popular centerpiece look? What you may not realize is you can do that without making EVERYTHING yourself: There are artisans and crafters who sell the individual components you may find challenging or too time consuming. Plus, you can buy your own supplies online when your needs go beyond what you can find at the local stores. With that approach in mind, here is how you can create five popular looks for a wedding or other event, along with links where you can get the components.

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1. Wood Planter Box Centerpiece with Table Number. Cube planter boxes are a straightforward way to combine a low-profile centerpiece and the table number. This is a favorite, expertly designed by Petal Pushers and photographed by Eureka Photography for a country wedding.

2. Rustic Tub or Bucket Centerpiece. Galvanized steel is showing up as an accent element in rustic weddings. This popular centerpiece, using a weathered tub, is actually a table-top lettuce garden by Garden Studio Design. I’ve adjusted the contents so you can get a similar look with more traditional greenery.

3. Tree Slice Centerpiece. Another way to bring natural wood into the table decor is to use a cross section of a tree’s trunk as a centerpiece base. This one features another popular centerpiece element–the lantern.

1. Wood Planter Box Centerpiece with Table Number

Cube planter boxes are an efficient way to combine a low-profile centerpiece and the table number. This is a favorite, expertly designed by Petal Pushers, who does top-notch floral design (contact them about wedding flowers design or rentals if you are near Dripping Springs, Texas). Centerpiece photography by Eureka Photography. (They do Texas Hill Country photography, but love to travel.)

Creating your own look is straightforward in one sense, but will require some skill if you want to use a variety of flowers. (Non-expert tip: Use hydrangeas instead of an arrangement consisting of different flowers as your floral base.

Here’s what you need and where to get it…

The planter box: Ania makes these wooden cube planters in several sizes, ranging from 3″ to 7″. I like them because they are lined and you do not need to worry about moisture. Ask her to make a listing for you with the amount of boxes you need and she will give you a discount.

Foam cubes: Using foam as a base can make completing your arrangement easier and quicker. Soak these 5″ cubes made from Oasis Floral Foam Maxlife in water until they are fully saturated and they will be ready to secure flower stems.

Table numbers: The hardest part of creating wooden table number picks is outlining and cutting the numbers. Jamie has you covered. She’ll make these 5″ wide table numbers with 8″ tall sticks in your choice of two fonts. You’ll receive them unfinished; just spray paint whatever color you’d like.

The Flowers and Greenery:

The centerpiece looks to be designed with lisianthus and, perhaps, dahlia blooms. You could use myrtle and/or euonymus as greenery filler to create a similar look.

2. Rustic Tub or Bucket Centerpiece

Galvanized steel is showing up as an accent element in rustic weddings. This popular centerpiece, using a weathered tub, is actually a table-top lettuce garden by Garden Studio. (They are a full service landscape design company in Southern California, which specializes in making outdoor spaces come alive.) I’ve adjusted the contents so you can get a similar look with more traditional greenery.

Metal Bucket: This metal container from Aimee is 10.25″ at the rusty-look rim, 5.25″ high, and 8.5″ around across at the base.

Pillar Candles: Choose these pillar candles in ivory or white and four heights. The price is right as well.

The Greenery

You could grow your own lettuce but it seems like more foresight than almost everyone planning a wedding would have. Fortunately, a mix of greenery will serve your purposes just as well. Here are two to consider:

Tropical Mix (top left in the image): The Tropical Wedding Greenery Combo Box includes a variety of six species of greenery: Cocculus, Aralia, Viburnum Greens, Cordyline, Pittosporum, and Safari Sunset Leucadendron.

Rustic Mix (bottom right in the image): The The Rustic Wedding Flower Combo Box includes a broader range of texture. If you like a red variety as accent, choose red hanging Amaranthus rather than green. The box includes: Dusty Miller, Silver Brunia, Scabiosa Pods, Bear Grass, and Hanging Amaranthus.

3. Tree Slice Centerpiece

Tree slices–round, wood slabs cut from the trunk or large branch of a tree–are a natural-looking way to add a rustic look to any decor. This centerpiece and the final two all feature a “tree cookie” base. Here, Justin sets two other iconic country elements on his: a lantern and baby’s breathe.

He sells the the ones pictured here (look in his shop for different sizes). I have to say I hesitated at first to feature Justin’s listings because of the price. At first blush it seems expensive for pieces of tree. Then I read the details. These are sealed with your choice of shiny or no shine finish. They are planed to be completely flat (no tilt or wobble) and he sends only those with the nicest-looking wood. The reviews convinced me.

Here is where you can find the lantern and baby’s breathe in the pictures:

Lantern: I couldn’t find one exactly like Justin used, but this one comes close. Rena sells it in black or ivory.

Baby’s Breathe: Notice how the baby’s breathe has more bright green in the centerpiece than in the picture under Create the Look? That’s the difference between artificial in the centerpiece photo and the real flowers. You can also get the real flowers tinted colors and/or with glitter. (Watch out, glitter sheds!)

Paint on bottles makes for an inexpensive, yet elegant look. The problem is it can be a little tricky and messy. A friend of mine spray painted centerpieces with her daughter and they ended up getting paint on the car. The repair work far outweighed what they saved by spray painting the jars themselves. Not to mention the time it took.

The good news is you do not have to actually do the painting yourself. Ashley will do it for you. You can find the painted mason jar, beer bottle, and wine bottle (as well as the wood slice) in her Etsy store for a few dollars each. Here’s where you can find each listing:

Mason Jar. You can get it any color. If yours is not in the dropdown list, write a request in the note to seller when you order.

Here is where you can find flowers and greenery, similar to those she used, at a good price (the real thing, not artificial):

Naked, Seeded Eucalyptus (top left in the Create the Look part of the image). Add much texture and dimension to your rustic centerpiece with this greenery.

White Roses. These are a nice 2-3 inches across when bloomed. To avoid surprise when you open the box, and to get the full beauty in your centerpiece, make sure to read the care instructions.

Eucalyptus (second row, right). Notice how different looking this variety is compared to the first? The tall, leaf-lined stems of this baby eucalyptus are perfect for narrow-neck vases like the beer and wine bottles.

Baby’s breath makes a wonderful, budget-friendly statement on it’s own; this centerpiece also features lavender, another frequent component of country-style decor. If that were not enough, they managed to nicely incorporate burlap and a chalkboard. Finally, floating candles and votives complete the look.

Here’s where to find the components for you to create a similar look (I mention them in the order they appear on the image, top to bottom, left to right):

Vases and Floating Candles. These are 7.5″ tall, 3.25″ round cylinder vases, but you can get other heights as well. The candles come in your choice of white, ivory, or any of 13 colors. Surprising Tip: As of this writing, you can actually buy the candles and vases separately for a better price. Choose “No thank you, I do not want candles” when adding the vases to your cart. Then click over to this listing for 3″ floating candles and add that item. It’s $8 less per dozen when you buy them separately! I don’t understand why.

Tree Slices. Those pictured are Justin’s sealed ones from #3 above. If you prefer Ashley’s, used in #4, go here.

Decorated Mason Jar. Ash sells these in both pint and quart sizes, and you can choose from several different ties.

Dried Lavender. If you are going to use lavender elsewhere in your wedding (like as bridesmaids’ bouquets), this is a good deal. But it’s a lot if you only want to accent the centerpieces, so you may want to go with the purple/blue larkspur previously mentioned in #4.

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